


Life Is Really Weird When You Want to Kiss Most of Your Friends

by lesbiannancywheeler



Category: Stranger Things (TV 2016)
Genre: Bisexual Steve Harrington, F/M, Joyce knows something is up, M/M, Multi, Polyamory, Post Season 3, Slow Burn, letters that "aren't" love letters, lots of pining, robin lesbian of wisdom
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-09-17
Updated: 2019-10-27
Packaged: 2020-10-20 06:35:57
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 4
Words: 17,297
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/20670914
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/lesbiannancywheeler/pseuds/lesbiannancywheeler
Summary: But there’s still the whole hanging out with Nancy and Jonathan thing that’s really getting to him. He’s seen them interact in a relationship before, and it’s never really bothered him, but he always hyper focuses on the interaction between them and he can’t figure out for the life of him why.Based on headcanons by @agentorgana on Tumblr.





	1. Chapter 1

Steve wakes up on the floor of Jonathan Byers’ bedroom. This has become the norm over the last month, waking up on a pile of blankets, sometimes with Robin by his side, while Jonathan and Nancy are up on the bed. The Byers’ house has become somewhat of a safe haven since ‘the battle of Starcourt’ as the kids have taken to calling it. Joyce had opened up her home to anyone who needed it.

Steve has barely been home since everything happened. It’s been nice to have a support system, even if half of them are under the age of fifteen. He never would have expected _this _group -his ex, her new boyfriend, that boyfriend’s mom and brother, and that brother’s friends- to become the people he spends most of his time with, but he’d be lying if he said he didn’t love the family he found himself in.

He shifts to sit up, leaning against the wooden panels of the dresser behind him. Robin hadn’t stayed over last night. He looks up at the bed. Nancy and Jonathan are both asleep, their legs wrapped together. Nancy has her arms wrapped around his waist. She’s wearing one of his shirts. Sunlight from the open blinds bathe them in a warm glow. Steve has been greeted with sights like this one countless times since he started crashing in Jonathan’s room. He’s doesn’t like to let himself think about why he keeps looking.

He throws on the jeans he kicked onto the floor last night and heads to the kitchen. The sounds of the kid’s voices echo down the hallway. He sits down with the group of kids crowded around the dining table while Joyce cooks up a stack of pancakes big enough to feed an army. Dustin gives him a fist bump while still intensely focusing on whatever Mike and Lucas are arguing about. They change topics when they notice Steve.

“Steve! Will you take us to the movies today?” Mike asks, still chewing on a pancake. El makes a disgusted face at him.

“Fright Night just came out last week and we can’t get into an R rated movie without someone older with us.” Will tells him.

Steve has basically become their chauffeur. Dustin says he’s easier to convince to take them places than Nancy or Jonathan. Steve won’t tell them it’s because he genuinely enjoys spending time with them all.

“You won’t all fit in my car. When Nancy and Jonathan wake up we’ll see what they say okay?”

“Nancy never wants to take us anywhere! We can just bike and meet you at the theatre!” Mike whines.

“Not today you won’t. It’s supposed to rain and I don’t want any of you catching colds.” Joyce scolds them.

She’s met with a course of groans and muttered curses from the kids. They all keep eating and talking and Steve doesn’t pay much attention to any of them, until eventually Nancy and Jonathan make their way into the kitchen. Nancy’s changed out of Jonathan’s shirt into a skirt and big yellow sweater and she just looks so _good _that Steve can’t force himself to take his eyes off her. They sit down at the crowded table, Nancy across from Steve and Jonathan beside her. She smiles at him and his chest aches softly.

“Nancy will you take us to the theater today?” Dustin asks, smiling through his tooth gap.

“I’ll take half of them.” Steve interjects before Nancy has the chance to say no. “I’ll call up Robin and see if she wants to come too.”

Nancy smiles again, and reaches out to grab Jonathan’s hand, twisting their fingers together. Steve can’t look away.

“Yeah we’ll take you, but later okay?” Jonathan says, being met with a chorus of cheers.

Robin comes over and they all relocate to the living room. Steve spends the next couple hours sitting on the floor getting absolutely destroyed at video games by her and the kids. Jonathan and Nancy are sitting behind him on the couch, her head on his chest as they idly watch the Communist Mutants from Space tournament. The irony of the game isn’t lost on any of them.

“I _wish _it had been this easy!” Robin exclaims when she sets the new high score.

Moments like this have become a comfort to all of them. Playing video games or watching movies together for some semblance of normal in their lives. A couple hours of the day when they can all pretend they haven’t just gone through the craziest shit. The Byers are moving out of Hawkins in just around a month and Steve doesn’t know what he’s going to do when they’re gone.

-

A few hours later they’re all standing in the front lawn while the kids divide themselves into the two cars. There’s a lot of fighting about who’s going with who. It hasn’t started raining but they decide, at Joyce’s anxious insistence to take the cars anyways. _“__It could start raining any minute.”_

Nobody questions it, not even the younger kids. Everyone knows why Joyce is so protective of the kids, even when it comes down to little things like this. They all understand.

“You shitheads are all going to end up at the same place in fifteen minutes anyways.” Steve tells them, but all the kids ignore him and start arguing louder. Jonathan shoots him the smallest smile though.

Eventually Steve and Robin end up with Dustin, Lucas, and Max, and Nancy and Jonathan take Will, Mike, and El. Steve rolls the windows down and Robin pops a tape into the cassette deck and they’re off.

Running commentary from the kids in the back seats fills the car over Robin’s music. Steve would have found it annoying a few years ago, before his life went batshit. Now the constant noise from a seemingly ever-growing group of preteens is a welcome distraction from the abyss of his daily thoughts. Nobody could live through the things he’s lived through and come out with a happy mental dialogue. Steve is always with other people now. It’s only when there are heavy lulls in conversations that he starts to really _think _about the monsters and the fighting. Even then though, he knows whoever he’s with is thinking similar things

He glances quickly at Robin in the passenger seat, her black fingernails tapping on the window as she sways lightly to the music. Steve doesn’t recognize the song. She has better taste than him. He’s so glad he met her, so glad he actually started paying attention to her despite his stupid popularity-seeking fuelled want to not associate with her at first. Dustin was right about primitive constructs and all that shit.

There’s no romantic feelings there anymore, and frankly when he lets himself think about it, he doesn’t think there ever really were. More a desire to date ‘a girl’ -the first girl he met after Nancy- than to date Robin. The wires of sadness over losing Nancy and friendship with this new, _really fucking cool _girl crossing in his brain. He absolutely loves her, but it’s a platonic, we-can-tell-each-other-anything love, a we-almost-died-in-a-Russian-base-together love. It’s perfect. His friendships have always been messy like that. He's always convinced he's in love with any girl he meets.

The ride to the theatre is quick, and the younger kids drag the older ones inside without even talking to them. Making it clear they’re only there to get them into the movie. Steve’s sure the guy at the ticket stand is skeptical about giving the kids their tickets, but there’s three seventeen-year-olds and an eighteen-year-old with them so it’s not like he can stop them anyways.

The group of kids grab seats in one of the front rows, and shoo the others away when they try to sit with them.

“We don’t need you to babysit us!” Mike spits out.

Will shoots Steve a sympathetic smile, he’s such a fucking good kid. The older teens find their own seats near the back.

Steve had expected Nancy and Jonathan to sit by themselves, across the theatre from him and Robin or something, so he’s caught a little off guard when Nancy sits in the seat directly to the right of him, Jonathan beside her. They don’t talk, but he still feels a weird mix of emotions stirring in his stomach. He’s sure Robin catches the glances he can’t stop giving them.

Maybe a fourth of the way through the movie he looks over at them to see Nancy resting her head in the crook of Jonathan’s neck, their hands laced together. He knows they both probably see him, but he just can’t look away. It’s at this very moment that Steve has a realization, multiple realizations, in this order;

_Fuck. I definitely still have feelings for Nancy. _

_Fuck. This group is too important to me to let shitty relationship drama break it up._

_Fuck. I have to ignore those feelings._

He sits in silence for the rest of the movie, not able to concentrate on a single thing happening on screen. He sees Robin laugh but misses the joke, sees Nancy flinch but doesn’t know what scared her. As soon as the movie ends he dashes to the bathroom, not even bothering to collect the kids.

He grips the counter with tight fists and stares at himself in the mirror. _Fuck fuck fuck fuck!_

He knows deep down that his feelings for Nancy never left. He’s always known that. But he was able to subdue them until he spent every fucking day looking at her and Jonathan together. Actually seeing her with someone else was a lot different from just knowing it was happening.

He spends as long in the bathroom as he can without seeming suspicious. He just _knows _Robin is going to make some stupid joke about him jerking off. When he gets back into the main lobby he sees everyone standing together talking, obviously waiting for him. Jonathan’s arms are wrapped around Nancy’s tiny frame, holding her in close to his chest.

“Been long enough hasn’t it?” Max shouts at him.

“Chris Sarandon getting you all hot and bothered huh Stevie?” Robin smirks at him, throwing an arm around his shoulder. _Fucking knew it_, he laughs to himself.

“Oh like any of you have anywhere better to be.” But honestly all these kids do have better social lives than him.

“Hey Steve, me and Jonathan were thinking, do you want to head to the diner and grab something to eat? Robin you can come too obviously.”Nancy looks at him with her huge blue eyes.

He shoots a helpless look to Robin. She’s always been up for hanging out with them, but a little skeptical. She doesn’t understand the relationship between the three of them and honestly, Steve isn’t sure he himself does either. He’s hoping she’ll politely decline for the both of them, but she just looks at him with her eyebrows raised. He can tell she’s asking _‘do you want to?’ _without her even having to open her mouth

So it’s up to him then. _Just say no just say no just say no_.

“Yeah sure!” He smiles at her. _Shit_.

“Okay great!” Nancy’s beaming smile is the most beautiful sight he’ll ever see.

“Yeah just got to get the kids home, curfews ya’ know? Then we can all meet up.” He digs himself in deeper, unable to just shut up.

“My mom’s picking me up.” Max intercepts.

“I’ll stay with you until she gets here, I’m close enough to walk home.” Lucas offers.

“Yeah me too!” Dustin adds, seemingly oblivious to the fact that Lucas probably wants to spend time with his girlfriend away from all his other friends.

“So then it’s just Will, Mike, and El? Me and Nance can drop them at my house and then meet you there.” Jonathan offers.

“Yeah sure that would be great.” Steve wishes he could just think of an excuse or something but his mind feels completely blank. He shoots a look at Robin but it’s helpless, she’s completely engrossed in a conversation with Max and El.

“Okay wicked, we’ll see you there soon!” Nancy smiles, grabbing Jonathan’s hand and beginning to herd the kids outside.

Robin and Steve head to his car, his brain completely fogged over with only one coherent thought; _stupid stupid stupid. _He doesn’t even think to start the car until he notices Robin staring at him, her seatbelt already strapped on.

“You okay dingus?” She raises an eyebrow at him.

“Yeah, yeah. All good.”

He doesn’t know what to tell her. _Sorry I’m freaking out because we’re about to go hang out with my ex girlfriend who I thought I was super over but I think I just realized I totally still have feelings for and her new boyfriend and they’re going to be super affectionate and I don’t know how I’m going to deal with it? _He doesn’t say any of that.

She shrugs and he turns the car on. Robin slips her mixtape back in and they drive to the diner, Steve in a quiet state of mild panic. During the drive he mellows out slightly to the music. He’s spent time with Nancy post-breakup before -granted most of it was monster fighting-, this probably wouldn’t even be weird. But when they get to the diner his anxieties start to well up again.

-

Robin skips over to her favourite spot, a big teal corner booth that’s worn from how many people have sat in it. Steve follows and slides in beside her.

“Wait let me out I want a milkshake!” She decides, standing up and trying weakly to push him out of the booth.

“Shouldn’t we wait for Nancy and Jonathan?” He lets her slide past him.

“Yeah probably,” But she skips over to the kitchen anyways, her white sneakers hitting the ground at an uneven pace. “I’ll get you one too!”

Tapping his fingers on the white table in a feebleattempt to collect himself, Steve considers if he should try to talk to Robin. Despite their constant joking, she’s really smart, and is actually great at giving advice. But before he can come up with something to say, she reappears at the table, a milkshake in each hand.

“Got you vanilla because last time you tried my strawberry you said you were going to throw up.” She slides it over to him.

“Yeah because they’re disgusting here!” She just nudges him in response, a wide smile on her face, and sits down beside him again.

They bant back and forth for a while, Steve miming throwing up multiple times while Robin laughs both at and with him, before they trail off.

“Y’know, I don’t really understand why you hang out with Nancy and Jonathan so much.”

Steve knows Robin is confused about the dynamic between the three of them. He knows that to her, Nancy and Jonathan are just the couple that broke Steve’s heart. She only knows about their history from a few conversations that were very emotional and less than sober on Steve’s part.

“It’s just like, shared trauma y’know? Like how we hang out because of Starcourt. The same weird shit has been happening to all of us and you just sort of bond.”

Robin gets that. That it’s why most of his (and now her) friends are fourteen-year-olds. A sense of community between people that have shared tragedy. It had started as Steve just not wanting to go back to an empty house after everything at the mall went down, and turned into something resembling a family. She takes a long sip of her milkshake before responding. He tries his best to hide the all the stirred up weird feelings as he answers.

“I just know they’ve hurt you. And believe it or not I don’t want to see you get hurt again, dingus.” She shoots him a semi-sympathetic smile.

Steve glances out the window and can see Nancy and Jonathan walking together. It’s starting to get dark outside but Nancy’s yellow sweater stands out vividly. Through the glass door, he can see that they’re holding hands. They don’t let go as they walk into the diner.

“I won’t” He brushes her off.

Steve watches the two of them walk up to the booth. Nancy looks gorgeous, the purple and blue tinge of the diner’s fluorescent light signs on her face.

“Hey guys!” Nancy smiles as she slides into the seat across from Steve and Robin.

Jonathan sits beside her, a smile on his face. It’s the first time Steve can ever remember seeing him actually smile, not just a small passing-people-on-the-street smile. Steve had always thought Jonathan looked sad. Even when he was ‘Freak Byers’ Steve noticed something there, they way he never seemed to smile and always dressed in dark colours. It had just made him an easier target. He’d hated it at first, why couldn’t the guy just dress normal, just act normal? But now he sort of liked the non-conformity of Jonathan’s less than put together appearance and personality. He was _different _from everyone else in Hawkins. He was _cooler _than them. Except maybe Robin. And Steve had begun to understand the reasons that the guy always looked like someone had killed his pet.

“Hi. Sorry I got us milkshakes before you got here.” Robin points down to the two white cups. “Do you all want to order now?”

“Yeah, sounds good.” Jonathan says, sliding out of the booth.

The four of them walk up to the kitchen counter, reading the big chalkboard menu signs. Steve takes a seat on one of the blue fake leather stools while he waits for the others to decide on their food. He’s come here enough to have a regular order, some of the workers have even began to recognize him. His parents are gone a lot and despite him learning to cook, there isn’t always food to cook with at home.

The bored looking girl behind the counter hands them their food, and they don’t even make it back to their table before Nancy’s milkshake ends up on the white tiles of the floor. She’d leaned on Jonathan a little too hard and fell. Everyone laughs as she runs to get paper towel from the bathroom, but Steve only focuses on how close she and Jonathan always are. How intimacy flows from them so easily no matter where they are.

It was a stupid decision to come here. He can tell already he’s going to be sort of numbly pining for Nancy all night. Watching her interact with her new boyfriend is going to be strange -stranger than normal now that he’s realized that maybe he’s not as over her as he thought, because it’s not like he hasn’t been hanging out with them for the last month- He slides back into the booth, mentally cursing himself.

“So Jonathan, senior year huh?” Robin asks in a clear attempt to alleviate the awkward silence that grew in Nancy’s absence.

“Yeah, it’s going to be weird at a new school.” He shrugs.

The move. Steve almost forgot. He lets himself think, just for a second -Jonathan gone, Nancy suddenly lonely in their small town with only a few people she really knows, Steve, looking at her just the right way one day while they’re alone- before he forces himself to stop. He isn’t that dick who steals peoples’ girlfriends anymore. Especially not to Jonathan-helped-him-kill-an-interdimensional-monster-Byers.

He tries to pay attention to the rest of Robin and Jonathan’s conversation, but finds his mind drifting more often than not. Focus has always been a little difficult for him in casual situations like this. Give him a monster dog to fight and he’s good, but put him in an English classroom and you’re lucky if he can stay on task and not get completely lost in his thoughts.

Nancy comes back to the table and slides into the conversation as easily as she slides into the booth. She shoots Steve another smile that warms him to his core.

Throughout the night he realizes _just how _in love Nancy and Jonathan are. They always find some way to have their bodies linked together. Hands touching or a head on a shoulder. Nancy was never really into that much physical affection when they were together. Does Jonathan have some weird thing about always touching? Was she really even into Steve?

He does pine quietly all night, staring at Nancy and just taking her in as much as he can without it being weird. He’s just trying to figure this all out. Up until a few hours ago he thought he was pretty much over this girl, but he’s starting to realize why he can never pry his eyes away from Nancy laying in Jonathan’s bed in the morning, or her hand as Jonathan holds it.

He just _looks _at Nancy all night. Watching her laugh and smile and say really smart things and the ways her eyes light up when she talks and squint when she laughs. Steve’s always thought she was amazing -the most beautiful girl he’s ever seen and way smarter than anyone else he knew- but she’s changed over the last year into an even better version of herself. He knows she’s become a lot stronger through everything that’s happened to them, and he admires it.

What’s weird is that he doesn’t feel jealous when he looks her and Jonathan together. Sure he maybe thinks about how it could be _his _arm around Nancy’s waist, her head rested on _his _shoulder, but there’s no malice towards Jonathan.

The chili fries Steve ordered are disgusting unless drenched in ketchup, and his hand reaches for the bottle at the same time as Jonathan’s Jonathan pulls away before their hands meet, but their eyes shoot up to look at each other, and they both freeze. It’s weird, it feels like time isn’t moving, like it’s as thick as honey. Neither of them break away from the awkward eye contact and it feels so god damn _weird_.

“Sorry.” Jonathan utters quietly, looking down.

“No man it’s okay, go ahead.” Steve pulls his arm back loosely, trying to maintain a normal look. What the fuck just happened?

They all spend the next couple of hours laughing and talking, about next year, about future plans, about some dumb movie Jonathan _really_wants to see but Nancy thinks looks too “strange”. Maybe Steve contributes a little less than usual to the conversation, but he still has a great time.

When it’s time for them all to leave, Nancy and Jonathan head back to his house together. Robin goes home, something about evening plans with her mom. Steve doesn’t know what they’d be getting up to at 11PM. He decides it’s probably best for him to stay at his own house tonight, to try and organize his thoughts about this whole probably-still-in-love-with-Nancy revelation.

“You’re not coming home with us?” Nancy asks, and all Steve can think about is how weird it is that Joyce Byers’ house has become _home. _She almost looks sad when he tells her no.

They all head out together before splitting into their separate cars. Steve has to drive Robin home like usual because she won’t just go take her god damn driver’s test. He’s driven her home enough times that he’s sure her mom thinks they’re dating at this point.

The four of them just sort of stand around by their cars for a while, nobody really saying anything, but also not wanting the night to be over yet. It isn’t until Robin drags him to his car saying she’s going to be late that Steve really starts to leave. He opens his door but Nancy bounds over to him before he can get in, her skirt and hair flying in the wind.

“I had a good time tonight.” and she smiles shyly before gesturing to Jonathan sitting in the driver’s seat of his car, looking at both of them but not really focusing on either. “He did too.”

Nancy jogs back to Jonathan’s car before Steve says anything, and he just sits down next to Robin, closing his door and watching them drive away.

-

Steve lays in bed awake for hours that night. It’s not even like anything crazy has happened. He _knows _what being in love with Nancy feels like. This isn’t new. Loving Nancy always feels like he can never think of anything else, it's infectious - it spreads. But there’s still the whole hanging out with Nancy and Jonathan thing that’s really getting to him. He’s seen them interact in a relationship before, and it’s never really bothered him, but he always hyper focuses on the interaction between them and he can’t figure out for the life of him why.

So he lays in his bed, under thin sheets in an empty house wishing that his life could just be normal for a few months. Because of course as soon as the annual monster _and _the Russians -which was new- were dealt with, he had to realize that he’s still in love with his ex who’s now dating his kind-of friend that he basically lives with now. What the _fuck_?


	2. Chapter 2

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> So shit. Maybe it’s not just Nancy he’s been staring at this whole time. Maybe it’s been both of the hands touching. Both of the bodies intertwined on the bed, and that just makes everything even worse and more confusing.

It’s almost the end of August, and Jonathan Byers’ moving away party is today. Steve thinks the title of ‘Moving Away Party’ is a bit much, the ‘Party’ part in particular. Every party he’s ever been to had been more than a hundred people wrecking some kid’s house who’s parents were out of town, throwing up in a pool or smashing a window. Tommy H and Carol making out while Steve sat on the couch beside them, trying to chat up some girl -which surprisingly didn’t work very often, he’d get a kiss or a dance or something -after all he was king Steve- but never anything more. Despite the big reputation he used to have, Steve didn’t actually lose his virginity until that night with Nancy-.

Those parties had all sucked though. At this point in his life Steve couldn’t give less of a shit about Tommy H and Carol. So he’s going to the Party that’s really just him, Jonathan, Nancy, and Robin hanging out in Steve’s bedroom because this is happening at his house for some reason. And he’s so glad he roped Robin into coming even though she barely knows Jonathan. He’s not going to be third wheeling like at every other party because he doesn’t think he could handle that with this particular group of people.

That’s right, the Nancy pining hasn’t gone away. Over the course of the month it’s only gotten stronger. Her smile and her eyes and everything he loved so much about her has just come back in abundance, not to mention the ways she’s changed. When they had starting dating she had been so timid and quiet, but now she has such a powerful confidence to her. She demands something and doesn’t take no for an answer.

He’s hoping the two six-packs in his fridge will help mellow him out while he hangs out with her and not make everything a thousand times worse.

Robin shows up at his house an hour before the other two get there, and Steve spends fifty minutes buzzing with anxiety hanging out with her because he really wants to tell her what’s up but he doesn’t even really know what’s up. It comes out out of nowhere -and seemingly all in one word- while she’s sitting on his kitchen counter shaming him for his choice in alcohol.  
“Robin I think I’m still in love with Nancy”

And she doesn’t even let herself processes for a second before going:

“What”

Steve shoves his head in his hands and sighs because now he actually has to explain this.

“I thought I was over her. You know, I told you in the bathroom that day.”

She nods. That couple of minutes in a small mall bathroom was a monumental point in both their lives.

“But now being around her all the time, I don’t think I really ever was -or not fully... I don’t know”

He looks at Robin, one leg crossed like a kid in kindergarten at circle time and the other danging off his counter, a sneakered foot hitting the cupboard rhythmically. She’s giving him the “You’re An Idiot, Steve Harrington” look that he’s become so familiar with due to Nancy, and now the kids and Robin. It’s probably true.

“We can deal with this.” is all she says before there’s a knock at the door.

Fuck.

Nancy and Jonathan are standing in his doorway, holding hands like they always seem to be. Nancy’s wearing a purple dress with square cut-outs on the chest and damn it looks so good on her. Jonathan, to nobody’s surprise, is wearing a dark T-shirt and jeans. Nancy gives him the biggest smile before he lets them in.

“I don’t know if you guys wanted to go swimming or something. The pool’s probably clean, the guy was here a few days ago and my dad left the cover on when he left.” Steve shrugs and he can already tell the night is going to go strangely, due to his own behaviour more than anyone else’s.

-

Steve is sitting on a pool chair with his legs dangling off the side. Robin sits beside him. Jonathan and Nancy mirror them on the pool chair across from them. Robin’s jaw is dropped to the ground.

“So you guys aren’t dating?” Nancy asks with wide eyes before she starts laughing. “I mean I knew neither of you had actually said anything but I just assumed.”

Steve isn’t really sure what to say, he doesn’t want to give away any information that might make Robin uncomfortable, and Robin bursts out laughing.

“Frankly I’m a little offended you thought I was dating this dingus!”

“You two just seem really close.” And Steve thinks that’s the first thing Jonathan’s said all night.

“I’m going to grab some drinks I’ll be right back.” More an attempt to change the subject than anything.

Steve beelines to the kitchen. He knows him and Robin are close, and visibly so, but Nancy had actually thought they were in a relationship. He wonders if that’s why she was a little catty to Robin at first before he cuts off that train of thought. Nancy is over him, that’s the entire problem he’s dealing with now.

He grabs the six-packs before going back out to the pool, and cracks one open before thinking anything of it. It’s only when Robin grabs one around ten minutes later that he realizes nobody else has been drinking, and then he realizes what an idiot he is.

He knows Nancy doesn’t drink, that she only does it when she feels like she’s supposed to be looking like she’s cool or having fun, that it’s a point of stress for her. It’s always something she does to impress other people, and he doesn’t want her to feel like she has to put on a show for anyone right now. Especially here. He knows she won’t let on to anything, but he also knows how difficult it must be for her to be back at the place that her best friend died. She’s never really liked spending time at Steve’s, and he wishes he hadn’t just tried to brush it off when she brought it up before.

“Oh shit hey Nance, you don’t have to drink obviously. I wasn’t thinking.”

She looks up at him, a little shocked at his genuineness, her eyes wide and mouth open slightly.

“Oh yeah no it’s totally okay. This is probably the best place for it, me and Jonathan trust you both a lot.”

And he wonders what Jonathan has to do with it until it hits him.

“You’ve never drank before have you?” He asks him, and gets shy shake of his head back as a response. “You don’t have to!”

Jonathan hesitates for a second before taking one. Nancy does the same thing, probably to prove she can. He wants to tell her to stop but he knows from experience that that won’t go well. Jonathan pulls the tab and takes a sip and almost spits it right out. Everyone laughs at the expression on his face, Steve and Robin full blown roaring and Nancy a quiet giggle as she pats him on the back.

An overwhelming feeling of home falls over Steve, not because they’re at his house. The building never meant anything to him, the people that live in it are barely home. It’s Robin, Nancy, and Jonathan that make him feel so happy.

He knows he should be jealous of Jonathan. This is his ex, the girl he’s in love with’s boyfriend. But when he sees them reach across the pool chair and kiss he just feels happy. When he sees Nancy get out of the pool and give Jonathan a wet hug he feels warm. It’s confusing as fuck, why isn’t he just mad at Jonathan? But he also kind of gets it. How could he hate Jonathan when he makes Nancy so happy? When they’re so good together?

Eventually they plow through the first six-pack before Jonathan takes off running and Steve knows this isn’t going to end well. He just hopes he doesn’t get it on the carpet because his parents will kill him when they get home,

Jonathan is in the first floor bathroom, hunched over the toilet seat.

“Fuck buddy, happens the first time, sorry about that.” He puts a hand on Jonathan’s back and he’s met with retching in response. Steve moves to Jonathan’s left side, sitting on the floor between him and the bathtub.

It takes a minute for Jonathan to look at him, and he flushes the toilet. And they just sit there, Jonathan still leaning over the toilet, his head almost rested on it with how hunched he is.

“My dad was an alcoholic.” Jonathan says, breaking the silence but managing to make it more awkward somehow. “Is still probably.”

Steve has no idea what the proper response is. He knew Jonathan’s dad was a dick, but he didn’t really have any of the details other than the whole running away from his wife and kids and into the city thing.

“He used to get really drunk and beat on mom. Say shit to me and Will, mostly Will. I guess I just sort of wanted to prove I wasn’t like him.”

He’s looking at him with huge eyes and it takes a beat for Steve to decide what to say. He goes with honesty.

“You aren’t like him, trust me. I know we don’t have a great track record,” He smiles but Jonathan looks down. Steve knows he deserved it that time Jonathan beat him up. “but I know you. You care about other people so much, especially Joyce and Will. More than you care about yourself. I don’t think you’ve ever hurt someone that didn’t deserve it. I don’t think you ever could.”  
  
Jonathan doesn’t say anything, and Steve doesn’t blame him. The weirdness of this whole situation isn’t lost on him at all.

He knows Jonathan needs _something_. The first time Steve had gotten drunk he’d been fourteen at one of Tommy H’s parties. He’d spent the whole night dry heaving over the toilet and wishing _someone _was there to take care of him. And for some reason he doesn’t think of Nancy to be the person to do that for Jonathan, he just puts his hand on the boy's.

“It’s okay” Jonathan is looking so deeply in his eyes and Steve really hopes he knows he means it.

And then Jonathan leans into his chest and starts crying, and Steve isn’t even thinking about how weird it is because he just wants this boy to feel okay. He puts one arm around him and uses the other to pat his back. When the tears dry up Jonathan pulls back from Steve’s chest, and looks up at him. Steve just smiles, trying to find some way to say that this _is _okay. Jonathan smiles back. They stay on the floor together until Nancy comes in and grabs Jonathan.

“Are you okay?” There’s a little stumble in her step as she tries to pull him up.

“Yeah, yeah I’m fine.” Jonathan nods.

Robin runs in after them too and holds both her hands out for Steve to grab. He lets her pull him up and he also almost falls.

“Guys I think we should go to bed.” Robin says laughing, and even through the haziness from the alcohol, Steve can tell she sounds as funny as she did on the Russian drugs.

“Yeah let’s head upstairs okay?”

He tries to corral them into his bedroom, and once they’re all in there Robin lays down on the floor immediately.

“You two can take the bed, I’ll go with her.” Steve points to Robin.

He’s about to lay down with her when Nancy stops him.

“Steve, do you have something I can sleep in?” She asks, sitting on the end of his bed. Her voice is light and airy.

“Yeah, yeah just give me a second.”

Journey, Frontiers Tour, 1983, with some type of space alien. That’s the logo on the blue shirt Nancy always slept in when she’d stay over at Steve’s. He hadn’t actually been to the South Bend concert, but he did buy the shirt for way more money than he should have. He digs through his drawers to find it because after they broke up he couldn’t bear to wear it anymore.

“Here Nance.” He looks away because he knows she’s not going to be thinking straight enough to change in the bathroom.

He tosses a pair of pyjama pants to Jonathan and a pillow to Robin, and ducks out of the room to go change into his own in the bathroom. When he gets back he’s greeted to Nancy on his bed in his shirt, and if that isn’t a _sight_. Jonathan has the pyjama pants and his own shirt on. The two of them curl up on his bed together. Robin is already passed out.

Steve turns off the lights, and right when he’s about to lay next to Robin, he hears a quiet, bell-like voice from in the darkness.

“Steve,” It’s Nancy.

“Yeah?”

  
“There’s room up here... If you don’t want to sleep on the floor.”

He knows Nancy is drunk, she isn’t thinking straight, but yeah, he actually really does want to go on the bed. When he hears no protest from Jonathan he inserts himself on the left next to Nancy, who’s arms and legs are intertwined with her boyfriend’s.

“Goodnight Steve.” He hears Nancy say.

“Goodnight Nance.”

“Goodnight Steve.” And that time it’s Jonathan.

“Night.”

Steve falls asleep with Nancy Wheeler beside him, Jonathan Byers beside her, and a tight feeling in his chest. When he wakes up in the morning Nancy’s left leg is draped over his and Jonathan’s arm reaches over her body and on to Steve’s chest. He detangles himself and slides out of the bed before anyone wakes up.

-

August is drawing to a close and the Byers’ things are all packed up in brown cardboard boxes. Steve came to say goodbye because the Joyce has done so much for him and Will is such a god damn good kid and El just lost Hopper, and _Jonathan._

Over the few times they’ve hung out and just how much time Steve spends at his house, Jonathan has become more than just Nancy’s boyfriend, hes become Steve’s friend. One of his best friends actually, not that means that much when you have the friend group that Steve Harrington does. He’d rank Jonathan right between _my ex that I spend far too much time with __who I’m still in love with _and _this thirteen year old I basically babysit __but he’s also genuinely my friend_.

Steve, Nancy, and Jonathan stand in his bedroom. It looks so strange empty, the posters down and the furniture gone, just a few boxes on the floor. There’s no trace of Jonathan left in the room. No evidence that he grew up here, that his experiences were shaped by living in this house. It uncomfortably reminds Steve of his own house which, while filled with stuff, had the same cold lack of personality to it.

Everyone is running through the house, getting the last things together to put in the moving van. Nancy runs to help Joyce with something, and the two boys are left by themselves.

Being alone with Jonathan is like swimming in molasses. There’s a heaviness in the air between them, mixed with Steve’s anxiety. He doesn’t know what Jonathan thinks of him, and he’s not sure he wants to. What would anyone think of their former bully who’s also their girlfriend’s ex boyfriend who is still head over heels for her? Steve definitely considers Jonathan a friend, but he’s not sure it’s a two way thing.

“Want help taking the last boxes out?” he asks, because what else is he going to say?

He’s not going to tell Jonathan how much he’s going to miss him when he’s gone. How much he loves hanging out with him at the diner, or the arcade,or even in the Byers’ living room watching some shitty kids’ movie. How much he wishes he’d just get over this thing with Nancy because he really values Jonathan as a friend. How he’s probably going to be counting down the days until the Byers come back to visit. How no matter how much he complains about it, Steve’s going to miss his depressing music during car rides, and the weird artsy movies he makes him watch.

He’s not going to talk about that moment they had in his bathroom, or how when Jonathan found him crying one night because of a nightmare, they both just sat next to each other four hours. “I get them too.” the only words spoken, Jonathan’s arm around him. Steve crying into his shirt.

He’s not going to say any of that. Jonathan would think it’s weird. Too affectionate. Jonathan probably doesn’t even like him, probably never really forgave him and just puts up with him for Nancy’s sake.

He’s not going to let himself think about “you have something in your hair, let me get it.” or “feel how cold my foot is, Byers.” and the _comfort _Steve feels around him.

  
“Uh yeah sure.” Jonathan speaking snaps Steve back to reality.

Their hands meet on thin cardboard, both having reached for the same box. There’s that weird feeling again, like they froze time by accident. Steve’s sure now that it’s just the strangeness of their relationship. Jonathan pulls away after what feels like too long, reaching for the other box, and Steve realizes he misses the feeling of his hand covering his own. He doesn’t let himself think about it.

He wonders if Jonathan will say something this time. If he feels weird or embarrassed or _anything _to justify how much Steve thinks about how it feels when they touch. Jonathan says nothing, he just hauls the box up to his chest and starts to walk to the hallway. Steve feels like he has whiplash from all the overthinking and zoning out he’s been doing in the last three minutes.

“I might miss you, Byers.” is all he says as he catches up with Jonathan in the doorway once time starts moving again.

“I might miss you too.”

That’s all he gets. Aside from the couple seconds it takes Steve to give him his phone number, Jonathan’s goodbye time outside is allotted to Nancy and the kids. Steve waits with the rest of them, and watches Jonathan go forlornly.He watches Jonathan and Nancy hug like it’s the last time they ever will. They’d all come so close to death so many times before and _this _was what had Nance clinging to his shirt as tight as she could clench her fists. What had Jonathan burying his head in the crook of her neck and kissing her and kissing her and kissing her.

And then the Byers/Hoppers get in the van -El _is _a Hopper. She had proudly flaunted her birth certificate-. And there goes one of his only three friends his own age.

He holds Nancy when the moving van pulls away, her crying into his chest, and he tries not to think selfishly about it.

He doesn’t let himself think of Jonathan until he gets a call a week later.

“Steve!” his mom had yelled from downstairs, actually home for once.

He’d run down, leaving Robin alone on his bed because usually when his parents called him it was when they noticed something he’d done wrong and he was in deep shit. He was surprised when he was just met with his mom’s outstretched hand holding the phone. He took it from her quickly, hoping he was right about who it was, and then forcing himself to tone down the excitement.

“Hello?”

“Hey, It’s Jonathan.”

“Oh hey Byers!” and he hopes that, over the phone, the obvious enthusiasm in his voice isn’t that apparent.

Honestly, when Steve had given him his number, he hadn’t really expected a call. He thought Jonathan would be more than happy to forget about his existence. The week of no contact had pushed that idea to the forefront of his mind and he had kind of convinced himself that Jonathan would never talk to him again. He’d been getting a little anxious waiting for a call actually.

“Had to call, let you know I haven't been eaten by an inter-dimensional monster.” and Jonathan says it so deadpan Steve can practically see his face.

“Shit I had the funeral planned and everything. White flowers, an oak coffin, Nance had a beautiful eulogy speech planned.” Steve doesn’t know if it’s more or less weird joking about Jonathan’s death when they both _had _almost died. Multiple times.

He can hear faint laughter over the phone. Every time he hears Jonathan laugh it sounds like he’s being let in on a secret. He really likes it.

“So how’s the new school going? I bet the people there are cooler than in Hawkins.” Classes had just started up a couple days ago and Robin’s incessant complaining was already driving him crazy. “Oh wait I forgot, cool, pretentious loners like you don’t actually have any friends. You’re too busy reading Vonnegut alone in the corner or something.”

“I wish. Mom’s been making a big deal about me and Will making new friends. It would be good for him I guess but...”

The unspoken “no new friends are ever going to understand that he’s been trapped in another dimension and then got possessed by a monster from that dimension.” hangs between them, and El is just a whole different ballpark.

“I don’t get why it matters to her so much that I do though. It’s just one more year until I graduate anyways.” There’s a little bit of sadness in his voice, and Steve would comment on it if it wasn’t seemingly always there.

“Aw Byers, I knew you could never replace me.”

Robin apparently didn’t find Steve Harrington’s bedroom that interesting, because she eventually comes downstairs to see what’s going on.

“Hurry up dingus or I’m leaving!” she calls from the hallway and Steve laughs.

“Hey Jonathan I gotta go sorry, Robin’s here and she’s sick of me not being there to entertain her.” he sticks a tongue out at her and she mirrors him in response.

“Oh. yeah okay. I’m going to give you my new address in case you want to send letters or something? I don’t want to lose contact and Will and El usually hog the phone.”

Steve has to turn away from Robin because he knows if she was how big his smile was he’d be getting made fun of for a week. He had never thought that Jonathan really liked him all that much. It was nice knowing he considered him a friend without the connection they both had to Nancy being involved.

“Yeah that’s cool!”

Steve realizes just how strong his desperation to have friends his own age is because now he’s going to be writing letters to Jonathan Byers, which a year ago would have been incomprehensible.

Jonathan gives him the address and Robin rushes him off the phone because she’s “dying of boredom”. There’s a hurried goodbye and Steve realizes just how much he actually misses Jonathan.

-

Picking up a pen and actually writing something comprehensible isn’t something Steve has done since before graduation, and now he’s doing it for Jonathan, regularly. The page is a mess of scratch marks and ink stains by the time he’s done because yeah, this really isn’t his strong suit and he’s completely aware of that. Nancy had practically rewritten his college essay with how much editing she had done.

But this thing with Jonathan has been really nice, and he never makes fun of him for his spelling mistakes or scribbled out words -though sometimes he does correct him-. Steve actually _knows _things about Jonathan now, and not just that he takes photos and loves his family like everyone knows about him. He knows that his favourite song is Bowie's heroes and his favourite colour is forest green and that last year he celebrated his birthday by building snowmen with Will. He knows that Jonathan actually does kind of miss his dad despite being fully aware of how shitty he is and would never want him around Will again, and he knows that Jonathan’s favourite smell is the perfume Nancy’s aunt gave her.

He likes to think that Jonathan remembers stuff about him too, little details that don’t matter so much in the bigger scope of what they’re talking about.

It would be really weird if it was only Steve doing it.

They’ve made plans to hang out next time the Byers/Hoppers come to visit but that’s not going to be until December so Jonathan’s sure they won’t actually do everything they wanted to. They’d written back and forth -and even talked on the phone for a bit when Jonathan could pry it away from El and Will- about seeing a couple of movies Jonathan wants to see. Steve is never going to forget the groan he got from Jonathan when he’d suggested Clue.

They’re going to go to the park with Nancy because she loves how pretty it is in the winter. Steve had said something about that being a couple thing and “you probably don’t want me interrupting your time with Nance”, but Jonathan had insisted that they’d both want to spend time with him.

It’s nice to feel wanted. Steve had known that since middle school, but this was different. He’d gotten used to being the it boy, Hawkins High’s star basketball player, the centre of attention at every house party, King Steve. But this was a better kind of attention. The adoration wasn’t mindless like it was then.

He feels warm when he thinks about them, which is often. He frequently finds himself playing back memories of the three of them at the diner, or in Jonathan’s room. The only thing he could compare it to is how happy he is when he’s with Robin, but it’s not quite the same. He reasons that it’s probably just because he has a different kind of bond with the two of them. Equally important to him, but not the same.

Neon red letters on Steve’s side table clock read 11:21 pm and he’s trying to sleep because he has an 8am shift at Family Video tomorrow but his mind is restless and he just can’t fall asleep. He’s thinking about Nancy, which painfully is something that he does often. He knows it’s weird and probably wrong, Nancy isn’t his girlfriend anymore and no matter how much he wishes she was, he can’t change that. He’d never want to take her away from Jonathan.

But that doesn’t stop him from imagining his arms around her, or her lips on his neck. Them sitting on his bed and Nancy’s on his lap while Jonathan’s arms surround him from behind and -w_hat the fuck?_

If Steve thought he had been having a hard time falling asleep before, now it was impossible. His inner monologue couldn’t shut up. _What the fuck why the fuck did I think that I’m not like that I like Nancy I don’t want to kiss Byers I don’t even want to hold his hand what the fuck..._

He’s not into Jonathan. That’s the only concrete thing he knows right now. He doesn’t know what compelled his brain to have that thought but he knows he doesn’t like Jonathan like that. He’d probably just spent too much time around the two of them this summer, got so used to seeing them together that when he imagined himself with Nancy, Jonathan was just there by default. That’s gotta be it.

But then he starts to really think, because it’s nearly midnight and he’s laying in bed and his parents are home, surprisingly, and what else is he really gonna do right now? And it’s really weird realizing that maybe, he might be a little bit into Jonathan. There’s very little that makes Steve happier than when he’s with him, or talking to him, or when he gets a new letter from him. Getting to read Jonathan’s thoughts put down on the page and learn all these things about him, and he’s always thought that he had _something _interesting about his whole look and maybe he didn’t realize until now but Jonathan is actually kind of pretty.

So shit. Maybe it’s not just Nancy he’s been staring at this whole time. Maybe it’s been both of the hands touching. Both of the bodies intertwined on the bed, and that just makes everything even worse and more confusing.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Early update! I have a closing shift tomorrow and definitely won't be awake enough to post this when I get home.
> 
> If you thought this was a ride just wait for next chapter!


	3. Chapter 3

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> And yeah, he really does underestimate her apparently, because how the fuck does Nancy know about this when he’s been this way his whole life and he didn’t even know it was a thing until Robin told him?

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Warning that this chapter contains homophobic slurs.

Robin Buckley’s bedroom is probably the messiest place Steve has ever been. There’s piles of books and clothes everywhere and posters that plaster the walls and a desk covered in stacks of paper and unorganized pens and some Christmas lights that bring up some less-than-savoury memories he doesn’t mention. On the floor, between a laundry pile and thedresser, there’s a purple beanbag chair, which is where Steve is sitting while Robin looks down at him from her twin bed.

Something else contributing to the mess on the floor is Robin’s bong, because her mom is away on a business trip for a couple of days and they’ve been planning this for weeks. Steve doesn't like bongs, he’s always been a joint guy, but it’s not like he’s going to say no to free weed.

He hasn’t had much but he’s definitely had enough that his brain feels a little fuzzy and everything just feels good. He feels happy.

Weed tends to make Steve’s nearly-nonexistent brain to mouth filter even less prominent than usual, and that’s why he ends up asking Robin “How did you know you were into girls?” because he’s been stressing over this whole Jonathan and Nancy thing for days.

This isn’t something they’ve ever really talked about, at least not in depth. Sure, Robin will point out girls she thinks are hot to Steve, or tell him about a new girl she’s “in love with” every couple of weeks, but that’s far from giving Steve her whole ‘realizing she was gay’ experience. He realizes after he asks that he probably shouldn’t have, but it’s too late now to take it back.

“You don’t have to tell me! If you don’t want to or whatever!” he tries to backtrack. One thing he’s learned from Robin about all this is that it’s personal.

“No it’s okay.” She smiles at him and shakes her head. “I guess one day I just kinda realized that the way I felt about girls was different than everyone else. All the girls I knew were super close with their girl friends and everything but nobody wanted to kiss each other, and they definitely didn’t want to have sex!”

Does he want to have sex with Jonathan? He pushes that thought away immediately.

He just nods in response and Robin gives him a look. He’s a little high so he’s not _exactly _sure what it means but he thinks she’s on to him.

“Is there any reason?” She gets off the bed and sits down next to him on the floor.

_Shit._

He just starts talking.

“I’m not gay. I loved Nancy. I _still _love Nancy. When I was a kid I would hold hands with my best guy friend until my dad saw and smacked me in the face for it. But it was nothing, I always liked girls.”

Steve knows that deep down, maybe that isn’t all true. He knows that he’s had more guy crushes than girl crushes, he just hadn’t really realized what they were yet, and he knows that he’s falling hard for Jonathan, but it doesn’t make any sense.

He also knows that he’s rambling and should shut up, but thinking about it just makes him anxious and makes it worse. Robin is just letting him talk too. She isn’t cutting him off or interjecting with anything so he just keeps going.

“I was thinking about Jonathan and it was really weird because I don’t like guys, I like Nancy. But maybe it’s just because the two of them come together in my mind. Two for one deal y’know? Nance and Byers. And how could I like them both? I can’t like Jonathan if I like Nancy because then I’m not gay, and I definitely like Nancy. But one time in ninth grade my friend who was a boy threw up at a party and I was in the bathroom just like, holding him and stuff while he did and it felt really good and-”

“Steve” she says, and her voice is as soft as it was in that mall bathroom.She cuts him off finally, _finally._

He looks up at her and he hadn’t even realized he’d been staring down at his hands that whole time, scared to make eye contact because then he’s actually saying what he’s saying. It’s real. He knows though, that he’s safe here. His friendship with Robin is so tender and nothing she says could make this wrong.

She moves down off the bed and sits in front of him, pushing the bong and lighter and everything out of the way.

“Have you ever heard of bisexuality?”

He just shakes his head.

“Okay, that’s okay. A lot of people don’t know what it is, or don’t know the name. It’s different for everyone I think, but basically it’s when you like guys and girls, at the same time.”

And that’s all she had to say before Steve feels tears welling up in his eyes because _he didn’t even know that was a possibility. _He runs a hand through his hair and exhales, not exactly sure what to make of everything.

“Hey dingus,” she says it slowly, like she’s worried that maybe right now isn’t the best time for that name. “you okay?”

“Yeah,” he nods. “yeah. It’s just, a lot. But it explains a lot I guess.”

The mood in the room is different now, but it’s not bad. Everything is just strange now and he kind of wants to smoke a bunch more so he doesn’t have to think about it and he also kind of wants to do a whole _lot _of thinking about it, so he settles for getting up and laying on his back on Robin’s bed.

She joins him, laying on her stomach, and the bed is so smallthat practically every part of their bodies are touching. Steve is so _lucky _to have the friends he has now, he can imagine how this would have gone down if it were Tommy H or Carol he was talking to.

They both fall asleep like that, as close together as possible, and despite everything Steve feels safe.

-

When you only have three friends your age, and too much free time on your hands (because you couldn’t get into college and your boss hates you so you don’t get many hours), you end up spending a lot of time with them. When one of them moves away, you end up spending a _lot _of time with the other two, which is why Steve has met up with Nancy every day for the last three days.

They’re in the park because Nancy wanted to do something different -“Steve all we ever do is hang out in each other’s bedrooms.”

And here’s the thing, when you get so used to fighting monsters from another dimension, and then evil Russians trying to bring _more __of _those monsters into your town, the rest of your life can just kind of feel boring. Nancy and him are just sitting on a park bench, drinking coffee that went cold hours ago out of a thermos.

It’s not like Steve is going to complain, he sure doesn’t want to be fighting monsters again. It’s just that he wishes he had _something _to distract him right now. When there’s a monster in front of him and a bat in his hand it’s just smash smash smash- get out alive, and there’s nothing else to think about. Spending time with Nancy had been weird before, but after that night with Robin a few months ago it’s just even weirder. It’s not like there’s any normal way to tell someone “Hey so turns out I’m still in love with you, and also probably kind of in love with your boyfriend.” You can’t just slip that casually into a conversation.

And god, he really has been noticing just how in love with Nancy he is. They’d gone to a Halloween party together last month, a strange parallel of _that _night they spent together last year. Robin had come with them -it was at the house of a mutual friend of Nancy and Robin’s, Nancy had History with her and Robin knew her from band-, which had made it a little less tense, but they’d still ended up spending a lot of time alone together. They danced together and when Nancy rested her head on his shoulder he was overcome with feeling. Unlike last Halloween this felt _right. _It’s been strange spending so much time with her after barely speaking for a year, and he realized just how much he had missed her.

But then there was Jonathan. It’s been two months since that conversation he had with Robin in her bedroom, and since then he’s had a lot of time to think about everything, but it doesn’t feel like he’s gained much clarity. He knows he’s bisexual. He’s found a lot of comfort in that word, he’s much less confused now, but it hasn’t made anything easier.

He realized that he’s in love with Jonathan just as much as he is with Nancy while rereading the boy’s letters. His writing paints pictures just as beautiful as the ones he takes with his camera. Steve thinks he could have equal success in both fields. Steve’s so _happy _every time he hears from Jonathan, in a way only paralleled by how he feels when he’s with Nancy.

But that’s the problem isn’t it? That he’s into both of them, and that even if he could pick just one, they’d still be dating the other.

Nancy hanging around Steve so often is a side effect of Jonathan having moved away, and with Jonathan gone, he desperately wants to make a move. He finds himself just staring in awe of Nancy so often. She wasn’t just beautiful -and god was she, with her big eyes and button nose and perfect body,- she was smart, so smart. The way she spoke and the things she knew just _amazed _him constantly. And three years of fighting monsters had turned the shy, quiet Nancy Wheeler into an absolute badass who takes what she wants and demands to be heard. Steve loves it, it’s hot.

Though there are still moments when she looks like the little 10thgrade princess she used to be, like right now as she sits on the park bench in a big white sweater, clutching coffee in her sweater-covered hands and looking down at it calmly. She’s not indestructible, but she sure acts like she is. Steve is glad he knew her then too.

He wants to put an arm around her, to hold her hand, to kiss her and laugh against her mouth and play with her hair and hold her to his chest and kiss her neck and-

He can’t do any of it, because that’s what Jonathan Byers does. Jonathan Byers that he thinks he wants to do all of that to too.

So he doesn’t touch her, at least not in a more-than-friendly way. And he doesn’t say anything weird to her... until he does.

“What are you thinking about?” she asks him from the other side of the bench after a particularly long silence.

“You’re beautiful, Nancy Wheeler.”

He knows he shouldn’t have said it, but it came out almost like muscle memory, and it’s true. Nancy doesn’t get up and leave, which is a good sign, but there’s undeniably a weird energy now. Neither of them say anything for what feels like far too long. The eye contact is killing him.

“Please don’t make things harder than they need to be.”

She looks sad when she says it, sounds sad too.

“Nance I’m sorry.”

“It’s okay. I think I should go.”

“Nance I’m so sorry.”

She gets up, pulls her bag around herself, and starts to walk away.

_Fuck._

He sits there for a long time thinking about how stupid he is.

She calls him later, when he’s laying in bed feeling sorry for himself. She says it really was okay, that she’s okay, but things were weird now.

Things are always weird for them, he wishes he could just get used to it.

-

So, Steve Harrington may be bisexual, but that doesn’t mean he feels okay talking about it. He likes the label, he likes knowing there are other people like him, that it’s not crazy or shameful- or shouldn’t be, even if general society thinks so. He’s perfectly comfortable _thinking _about boys he likes, but when Robin tries to _talk _to him about it, he freaks out, it feels like he’s committing a crime. He’s not sure why confirming things verbally is such a huge deal to him.

They’re on his bed, and Robin’s been trying to get him to spill his ‘type’ when she asks “What about Jonathan?” and oh fuck he was not ready for that.

“uh, p-, uh,” he can _hear _his sputtering, but his brain can’t think of any words at the moment. “no.”

Robin smirks at him.

“Well then what _are _you into? I know what you like with girls but you have a whole new market of people I can set you up with now!” she smiles at him, gently punching his shoulder.

“Look Robin this isn’t really something I want to talk about.” He runs a hand through his hair, a nervous tell.

It feels wrong. There’s a voice lurking in the back of his mind saying all this shit to him. He’s a queer. He’s a faerie. He’s a fag.

The worst part is the voice isn’t Tommy H’s or Carol’s, or even any of the other assholes he hung out with in high school. It’s his own.

Robin stops as soon as she realizes Steve is actually upset.

“Steve, you know it’s okay?”

The last thing he feels is okay right now. He wishes he hadn’t even told Robin so he could keep it all in his internal monologue and wouldn’t have to _talk _about it.

“Of course it’s okay. When you told me you like girls-”

That’s another thing. He doesn’t want to say anything that will make Robin feel like he does.

“Steve.” She cuts him off, looks at him deep in the eyes. “You know it’s okay.”

He holds her gaze for what feels like way too long, another time-just-stopped moment. He leans back against his headboard, another hand through his hair.

“I guess it’s just, I was King Steve for so long you know? And King Steve was an asshole. I said so much shit to people, and now I’m everything I made fun of them for.

A particular memory of calling Jonathan a queer stands out.

It goes father than the liking boys thing too. Steve’s basically fallen from grace in Hawkins. No girlfriend, his friends are all ninth graders, Tommy H only looks at him to sneer and yell a taunting insult. This is just a whole new level to add on top of everything.

“I know it can be really scary, trust me I get it.” Robin laughs nervously. “But there’s nothing wrong with you. It’s going to take a while to get comfortable with everything, and honestly in this town you should have your guard up, but just because everyone here is an idiot doesn’t mean you have to feel bad.”

She reaches her hand out and puts it on top of his. Black nail polish is chipping off her fingernails and she has a snake shaped ring on her middle finger. Steve almost cries for two reasons, fear of all this shit, and how much he loves Robin.

-

The gutter pipe on the side of the wall has a dent in it. When you stick your foot in at the right angle, you can grab on to the roof and heave yourself up. If she remembers, and she always remembers, there will be a finger space sized opening between the window and it’s frame. With enough elbow grease, a hand slid in between that crack can push the window open, and you can climb in. This is a routine Steve became intimately familiar with while dating Nancy, sneaking into her room because her parents will “lose their shit” if they find out she has a boy in her room.

This is also how Steve entered the Wheeler residence two hours ago, at 10:17 PM.

It’s just the two of them tonight. Mike is at the Sinclairs’ and Robin is working a closing shift. Karen, Ted, and Holly Wheeler are asleep in their beds. Steve came here for a specific reason, which he’s been putting off for the last two hours.

“You can’t put the music up that loud! My parents will hear!” Nancy laughs at him, so he turns the record player’s volume down.

“Well the least you can do is come dance with me then.” He makes an exaggerated movement, bowing his head and holding out a hand for her to take.

Steve had expected things to be weird after their last meeting. A tension between them, or Nancy just not wanting to talk ever again. She’d probably told Jonathan, so he was gone too.

What he hadn’t expected was a call from the Wheelers’ house two days later with an excited voice on the line shouting “He’s coming on the 20th!”

The voice was Nancy, and the he was Jonathan. The Byers/Hoppers had set a date for their first return to Hawkins, coming on the 20thand leaving on the 4th. Fifteen days.

Fifteen days where he would get to spend time with Jonathan again- with Nancy. With both of them together again. Every type of anxiety -anticipation _and _fear- bubbled in his stomach.

Nancy gets off her bed and takes his hand, swaying along with him to Take on Me, their dance not fitting the song in the slightest.

Everything had gone back to normal, and Steve didn’t want it to change.

He’d come to see Nancy to tell her about his sexuality revelation. He’d been trying for nearly a month, but couldn’t bring himself to. It was inevitable though, telling Nancy. Steve knew he wasn’t incredibly intelligent -his grades spoke to that-, but he wasn’t stupid enough to think he would never tell her.

The song ends and Nancy, in a laughing fit, stumbles back on to her bed. With her blue nightdress and pink bedsheets she looks just cinematic. Steve had always thought she had the looks to be in movies. She also looks incredibly endearing, and he knows he can’t put this off any longer.

“Hey Nance? Can we talk for a second?”

She looks up at him, nodding and saying nothing. Neither does he. The next thing he says could change their friendship forever. He takes a deep breath and closes his eyes.

“I like boys.” He chokes it out, that wasn’t exactly what he wanted to say. “Girls too! Of course! I’m not gay!”

He’s rambling again, unable to shut up and Nancy’s eyes are wide in shock but she doesn’t look disgusted so he’s taking that as an okay sign and his mouth is moving too fast before his brain can think of things to say.

“Bisexual!” Finally he found a word he actually intended to say. “That’s what Robin called it. I don’t know if you’ve ever he-”

“You underestimate me Steve Harrington.” Nancy cuts him off with her I-know-more-than-you smile.

“Excuse me?”

“I know what the word bisexual means.”

And yeah, he really does underestimate her apparently, because how the fuck does Nancy know about this when he’s been this way his whole life and he didn’t even know it was a thing until Robin told him?

“Oh.”

Steve’s _freaking _out. Why won’t Nancy _say _something. He’s so scared of whats going to come next.

Back when they were dating, when he was still King Steve, he’d been with Tommy and Carol and Nancy. Him and Tommy had been making fun of some kid who’s name Steve can’t even remember anymore, but he does remember calling him a queer after Tommy called him a fag. Nancy had lightly berated him, a quiet “Stop.” and a _look_. But this was different. This wasn’t some stranger.

Instead of saying anything Nancy leans forward and wraps her arms around him tightly.

“Steve, I’m always going to care about you.” She says, her voice muffled against the fabric of Steve’s shirt that her face is pressed into. “This doesn’t change anything.”

Relief hits his body instantly, like a ton of bricks. He feels like he might start crying and god damn these last few months have been so emotional. It feels like all of his feelings have been heightened, and now he can finally decompress. Nancy _knows _now. He hadn’t realized, but everything had led up to her response, how she would react.

They stay embraced for so long and Steve is gently weeping by the time they break apart. Happy tears, extremely happy tears that trail down his face and drop on to Nancy’s sheets. He feels light, like he’d been carrying a boulder and finally set it down.

“Steve?”

He looks at her. He loves her so much – in every sense of the word.

“Do you like Jonathan?”

And that’s the last thing he ever would have expected out of her mouth.

“What?” Because he really isn’t processing fast enough to come up with a coherent response.

“It’s just, I’ve _seen _the way you look at him. It’s okay, you can tell me. I won’t be upset.”

“No.” He sputters out, and tries to sound convincing. “It’s just, there’s a guy at work and it got me curious-”

He’s talking too fast, blabbering and sputtering and choking on his words. He’s sure she can see right through him, but she keeps telling him she believes him.

Things might not go back to normal, but for once Steve is okay with that. They might be better now.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Late chapter I'm sorry! I've been super busy with school and work recently. But what a ride. Leave a comment I'd love to know what you thought! Next update (the last chapter) will probably be around next Saturday.


	4. Chapter 4

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> They all end up on the floor, talking and kissing. It’s all hands and bodies and mouths and colours and feelings. The three of them fall asleep on the floor holding hands and Steve has never felt so much concentrated love in a room before. He’s sure he won’t remember this tomorrow. He hopes he won’t remember this tomorrow.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Warning that this chapter does contain homophobic slurs

Snow is gathered on the windowsills of Steve’s bedroom. It’s freezing cold outside and he doesn’t work today, so he has confined himself to his house all day.

His parents are home, surprisingly -an off week between a business trip and a vacation to some southern country they’re not taking him to with them- and he really isn’t in the mood to put up with them today. Recently all he hears from his dad is shit about him not getting into college. Yesterday had been particularly bad. _“What kind of man are you Steven? Not doing anything with your life and spending all your time with that dyke Buckley girl.”_

Steve had been _pissed_.

People talked about Robin, Hawkins is a small town, of course they did, but nobody actually _knew_. It filled him with a white hot rage every time he heard it. Anyone who was different was a faggot or a dyke or a faerie.

And then he had been sad.

This wasn’t some asshole stranger on the street, this was his father – and yeah, Steve had always known his dad _was _also an asshole, but it was different. He knew he could never tell his father about himself, could never tell his mom either.

Steve had planned around it. He’d probably stay in Hawkins all his life. He was rich enough to get out of this town, but not smart enough, and his parents would definitely cut him off if they found out the truth. Staying in Hawkins meant he would never approach another guy. He could look and think all he wanted, but he could never act. He considered himself lucky that it probably wouldn’t hurt too badly to settle down with a girl. A nice girl from another rich Hawkins family that his parents liked. Nancy could have fit into that mold, and he would have been happy.

Avoiding his parents had meant avoiding the rest of his house, so he had stayed in his room all morning, listening to music and doing fuck all. Eventually he starts looking through the box under his bed that houses all the letters Jonathan sent him. There’s roughly thirty envelopes in there from the almost three months since he moved away, all varying in thickness and contents.

The first one he picks up has three photos inside – portraits. Will stares back at him, a small nervous smile on his face. There’s one of El too. Her hair is longer, held back in two scrunchies. She’s laughing ferociously, Jonathan had written that Will had told her a joke right before the picture was taken, intending to ruin it but only making it better. The third one is of Joyce. She looks serene in a way Steve has never seen before. Getting out of Hawkins has been good for her. She’s still holding a cigarette though, Jonathan had said he doesn’t think she’ll ever break the habit.

This happens often. It used to be when he was bored, or on a day when he missed Jonathan or Joyce or the kids, if he wanted to see their faces or read about their days, but now Steve finds himself looking through the letters and pictures frequently.

He’s learned a lot about Jonathan from these letters, and he thinks maybe Jonathan understands him too. There’s something deeply intimate about the letters that Steve can’t quite pinpoint, but he feels _known_.

There’s no denying that Steve’s fallen hard for Jonathan.

Jonathan is going to be back in Hawkins in two weeks.

Earlier this month, Jonathan had let Will borrow his camera, resulting in a series of photos of Jonathan that had been sent to Steve with a letter. According to Jonathan the photos weren’t great -_“Really good for a beginner, but I still have to teach him a lot.”_\- but Steve loved them. There was a candid shot of Jonathan leaning against his car that captivated him particularly. Maybe it was how good his jacket looked on him, or maybe it was the way all the brown tones of the picture looked so good together, or maybe it was because this was a rare picture of Byers _smiling_.

Steve got a piece of tape out of the roller on his desk and stuck the photo on his wall above his bed - right next to one of Nancy and himself that was taken by his mom back when they were dating that he was never able to make himself get rid of.

-

Sometimes, late at night, if his parents were fighting that day or if he had woken up from the upside-down laden nightmares he still gets, Steve would turn his bedside lamp on and just look at the three of them on his wall.

-

Jonathan Byers cut his hair. Only slightly shorter than it was last summer, just a trim, but Steve can tell because Jonathan Byers is standing right in front of him.

The Byers-Hoppers just pulled up in front of the Wheelers’ house. Will and El had run out of the car as quick as their legs would carry them, directly into the arms of their friends. Jonathan had taken a little longer, but Nancy had been right there as soon as he was standing on the yard.

Steve is watching them, her arms around him and her face in the crook of his neck. If it weren’t for the snow covering the ground in a sparkly white coating, Steve would think he was in the summer again. It feels good. It feels right, almost.

Robin is beside him, though her and Jonathan don’t know each other too well, she had gotten closer to Nancy in his time away, and had wanted to greet them anyways. A conversation in her room one day where Steve was feeling particularly reckless had led to him confessing his feelings for Jonathan to Robin. It had been a casual mention, no crying this time, all good, but it did mean Steve had to deal with Robin smirking at him as he watched Jonathan make his way to the house.

“Byers, man good to see you!” He pulls Jonathan in for a quick hug and slap on the back and while he’s holding him he’s struck by just how much he never wants to let go.

“I actually missed you.” Jonathan smiles when they pull apart from each other. “Don’t get a bigger head about it.”

The whole lot of them make their way into the Wheeler house. This is where they’ll be staying, Jonathan and Will and Joyce and El (under the cover of being a distant relative of the Byers). Steve can’t help but hyperfocus on the fact that Nancy and Jonathan will be under the same roof for an entire fifteen days. He plays various scenarios of them -Sitting on the couch together. Nancy’s head is on Jonathan’s chest as they watch one of his pretentious artsy movies. They’re in the kitchen. Jonathan is making breakfast while Nancy sits at the table wearing one of his sweaters. They’re in Nancy’s room. They’re alone. It goes through his head over and over. They will be here, with each other, and Steve won’t be. He’ll see them of course, but there’s a level of separation between them. And as much as he thinks and wishes about it, asking Karen to house another person for the holiday would be ridiculous. Yes, the Wheeler’s have a large house by Hawkin’s standards, but it only has so much room. It’s smaller than Steve’s and they’re going to be cramming nine people in for half of a month, not to mention the swarm of kids that will likely be there as often as possible. It’s not even worth entertaining the thought that he could stay as well. Steve is going to spend the holiday alone in his empty house, while everyone he loves (save Robin) will be here.

The kids run down to the basement as soon as they set foot in the house, leaving everyone else to settle in the living room.

It’s almost strange seeing Jonathan in person now. They’d been so open with each other over their letters, but now Steve is nervous to say anything to him. It doesn’t help that Nancy is here too and he can barely form a coherent thought watching the two of them.

They don’t break apart for a second. Their hands are entwined the entire night and it seems they’re finding every other way to be touching possible. An arm around a shoulder, a head whispering into an ear.

Everyone stays in the Wheeler house until late at night. The kids come up to inform Karen and Joyce that they’ve planned an impromptu sleep over in the basement that night, so Steve and Robin are the only people that _aren’t _sleeping in the house.

He doesn’t know when the appropriate time to leave is. Karen and Ted and Joyce have been talking amongst themselves for hours, and while Nancy and Jonathan are there too, it seems like they really want some alone time and he doesn’t want to intrude.

Jonathan has also been giving him looks all night that he can’t decipher. They’re not hostile, it’s just that every so often -more than that maybe, Steve can’t seem to be able to take his eyes off of him and Nance- he’ll look at Jonathan and he’ll just be looking back. Every time he looks down nervously afterwards, and Steve feels guilty without knowing why.

Eventually the adults head to bed, and it’s just Steve, Jonathan, Robin, and Nancy left in the living room. It feels like they can actually talk without Karen, Ted, and Joyce around.

“So how does it feel to be out of Hawkins?” A safe question, but aside from their letters and that drunk night in the bathroom, him and Jonathan have never really _talked_, and it’s strange doing it in person now.

“It’s good of course, it’s nice to not have to fight any monsters.” There’s a little nervous laugh from all of them. “But I miss it y’know. I miss taking pictures of the same things I’ve taken a billion pictures of before. And of course I missed you all.”

They keep talking, surface level conversations because Steve is too nervous to _really _talk to them but also hasn’t found an appropriate opportunity to leave. At some point late at night, Robin excuses herself with some mumble about having to get home. Steve knows exactly why she's leaving and he's going to kill her for it.

"Oh, Robin you can stay the night if you want to!" Nancy offers.

"No my mom will freak out if I'm not home soon. But thanks." As she gets up from beside Steve on the couch, she winks at him.

So now it's Steve alone while Jonathan and Nancy are sitting so close together on the couch across from him. He tries not to be too self pitying as the night goes on. Eventually it gets late enough that Nance asks:

“Steve do you just want to stay over? I think we can all fit on my bed or there’s some extra sleeping bags or something?”

And Steve really _wants _to stay but also knows that he probably shouldn’t, but a yes leaves his mouth before he can stop himself. There’s a lot of half formed plans before they all just seem to be okay with trying to cram themselves in Nancy’s bed and Steve really thinks he could die here.

-

Once again, Steve finds himself in the Wheeler’s living room. It’s Christmas day and Steve left his family Christmas party to drive here.

The kids are all crowded around the tree and El especially has a look of wonder over her entire face. This might be her first Christmas. Karen and Joyce are tending to Holly while Jonathan takes pictures of everyone. It feels right, this feels more like family than Steve’s ever had, even if Ted asleep in his chair reminds him a bit too much of his own dad.

Gifts are exchanged and the kids freak out about whatever nerd crap they got each other. Steve does think Max’s new illustrated-by-Will skateboard wheels do look awesome though. Steve got Nancy a typewriter she’d been eying and Jonathan some camera film that the guy at the store had said was top quality. Nancy got Steve some kickass new sunglasses and Jonathan got him a cassette of Queen’s _The Works -_one of the only bands they both like- Steve had to stop himself from crying when they gave them to him. Jonathan definitely got pictures.

Later in the day, after people have broken up into their little groups, he ends up in the kitchen alone with Joyce. She’s sitting at the table drinking a cup of tea. She looks happy, the move away has done her good. Steve hopes being back isn’t hard for her.

He gets himself a mug and sits down across the table from her. Steve has sort of viewed Joyce as a mother figure since the summer which is extremely embarrassing but very true. She opened her home to him after all the shit he and Jonathan went through, after all the shit he said about her. She was so kind to him and he deserved none of it.

“You’re good for them.” She smiled at him.

Steve didn’t know how to respond, or what she meant really. Nancy and Jonathan were perfect on their own. They didn’t need some stupid ex-jock wash up third wheel.

“I know you’ve had rough times, but they need you.”

She drinks her tea and he follows suit, a comfortable but slightly confused silence between them.

-

Steve feels out of place in the Wheeler’s basement. The party has made this space entirely their own with all their nerd shit, he feels like a little kid. Nancy and Jonathan are also here though, which makes him feel entirely like he’s in the right place at the same time. It probably shouldn’t, he is a separate, invasive entity from the two of them, but any time he spends with them feels so _right _in a cosmic way, like everything’s aligned perfectly. Or at least it usually does.

It’s New Years Eve, approximately twenty minutes until New Years Day and everyone has been acting _weird. _They’re all sitting spread apart from each other on the floor connected by waves of tension

All night Steve hasn’t been able to shake the fear that Nance has at some point told Byers about his sexuality. He has no reason to think this, and no real reason to think Jonathan would feel any particular way about it, but it’s paralyzing him. Steve has never been an anxious person, hell he was the king of every high school party, but right now he’s so scared to do or say anything.

Jonathan and Nancy aren’t acting normal either. There’s a haze of slight drunkenness clouding his judgement, but he’s sure _something _is up. Jonathan shoots another glance between Steve and Nancy and his anxiety spikes.

Nancy has been fidgeting and looking around nervously all night, and when she picks up a can of some god awful beer Steve managed to get for them, he knows there's something wrong.

They pass the time drinking quietly. Every so often someone starts to say something, but most of the attempts at conversation fizzle out quickly.

All this nervous drinking means they get hammered _quick_, and soon that slight haze starts getting really foggy. All Steve is really coherently aware of is Nancy sitting on Jonathan’s lap.

“Did she tell you about me?”

And maybe he’s drunk but he’s sober enough to wish his brain to mouth filter hadn’t _completely _dissolved with every sip he took. Because what if Nancy did tell him, and now Steve has to confront this when he feels hazy and confused and a little bit like he wants to cry.

Jonathan just shakes his head, confusion painting his face and Steve is so relieved when there’s no follow up questions. Jonathan just stares at him for reasons he can’t begin to figure out.

The clock is ticking closer and closer to midnight, and they’re all drinking definitely way too much, but everyone’s coherent enough to hear Nancy when, leaning off Jonathan’s body with her hand on his shoulder to support her she asks “Babe would you hate it if Steve was my midnight kiss?”

Suddenly Steve feels like all the alcohol has been flushed out of his system as he stands up to leave at the same time that Jonathan whispers “No.”

Jonathan gets up, grabbing on to Steve’s arm and trying to get him to stay. Steve is talking, he can’t hear the exact words he’s saying but he knows he’s rambling on about how he’s ruined everything between the three of them.

“Steve.” Jonathan says, still gripping his arm. “We don’t want you to leave.”

For reasons Steve isn’t sure of, chalk it up to the way the room feels like it’s spinning around him or some stupid homoerotic desire he isn’t confronting, he gets up really close to Jonathan’s face.

“Oh you _want _me to kiss your girlfriend?” And he lets out an I-can’t-believe-this-shit laugh.

And then the next thing Steve processes is Jonathan’s lips on his own and he _can not _understand but he is also definitely kissing back.

Steve’s not sure if midnight strikes while they’re kissing or when Nancy slides her way in between their bodies and also kisses him. They stay like that for a long time until she pulls away laughing, laughing at the absurdity or all of this, and Steve is laughing too.

They all end up on the floor, talking and kissing. It’s all hands and bodies and mouths and colours and feelings. The three of them fall asleep on the floor holding hands and Steve has never felt so much concentrated love in a room before. He’s sure he won’t remember this tomorrow. He hopes he won’t remember this tomorrow.

-

When he wakes up he absolutely does remember it, kissing and hugging and _Nancy and Jonathan_. Jonathan’s leg is intertwined between his own, dangerously close to his crotch, and Nancy, on his left, has an arm thrown over his chest. He must have been in between them when they fell asleep. He also has a splitting headache and _god he should never drink again_.

He has no clue what time it is but he can’t stay here, can’t deal with this right now. He screwed up so bad and he can’t think about it and _look _at them. So as gently as he can, he pries his body out from between Nancy and Jonathan, and grabs his bag from the couch. He tries not to make any noise going up the stairs and out the door.

It’s still dark out, which limits his options right now severely. The last place he wants to go is back to his house -where his parents will either hear him come in and scold him for being out so late, or maybe even worse, not notice he was gone in the first place-, but it’s not like he really has any other choice.

Robin is who he really wants to see right now, but he knows he won’t be able to tell her. He’s so ashamed of everything that happened. It had been going great for the last few months. Nance and Jonathan were happy together and Steve was their friend. That’s how it’s supposed to be. Steve is _not _supposed to let a drunk Jonathan and Nancy kiss him.

He walks home, he’s probably still drunk. Nancy and Steve both live in the rich part of town but Steve’s family is substantially richer, meaning his house is both bigger, and further out. It’s a decently long walk and Steve feels _horrible _the entire time, like all he wants to do is sit down on the sidewalk and cry or maybe throw up.

The sun is just starting to rise as he gets home, a sickly yellow sky overhead. He opens the door and, no surprise, his parents don’t even wake up.

It’s always incredibly quiet in the house, a ghost town even when his parents are there. When Steve is home alone he blasts music or a movie so he doesn’t feel alone. The only sounds he can hear right now are his breathing, his footsteps, and his thoughts.

He falls into bed as soon as he steps foot in his room, trying to calm down. It doesn’t work very well. He lays there for what feels like hours, watching it get brighter outside and his clock ticking, and thinking about how he can never see Nancy or Jonathan again without probably dying of embarrassment. Every so often he falls asleep for a little bit before waking back up in a panic. He almost goes downstairs and calls Robin to see if he can go over, but he can’t bring himself to.

It’s 8:45 when Steve gets out of bed, still panicking. His heart rate has calmed down from when he woke up entangled with Jonathan and Nancy that morning, but he can’t stop his brain.

_I ruined it they probably hate me now I should have just kept quiet I shouldn’t have let Jonathan kiss me I definitely shouldn't have let Nancy kiss me oh god what if they’re mad at each other they must be mad at me and probably never want to see me again-_and so on.

He slept in his clothes last night, and again in his bed this morning. A wrinkled pair of jeans and white sweater. He doesn’t change before rushing downstairs, trying to get outside fast enough that he won’t have to deal with his parents.

His dad is nowhere to be seen, meaning he must be out or in his office, and Steve can hear his mom in the kitchen. He makes a point of avoiding her as he walks to the backyard. She’s easier to talk to than his dad by far, but her niceties always feel stale and false and leave him wishing he hadn’t tried in the first place. And it’s not like he’s _ever _going to tell his parents about any of this.

The pool is drained, and Steve spends a long time staring into it’s empty depths. He wishes he’s known Barb, had been her friend. She deserved better than to die at some asshole’s pool party. He wishes he had been any good at helping Nance cope with her death instead of trying to push on and not think about it. He tries to stop himself from wishing that he’ll still have the chance to help her.

A thought crosses his mind for a moment, he could go back to the Wheeler’s and find Nancy and Jonathan and try to apologize for everything last night. He almost gets to his driveway before stopping himself, sure it’s going to make everything worse. He isn’t able to avoid them though because as soon as he makes it back to the pool he hears a yell coming from inside the house.

“Steve?” It’s his mom’s voice. “There’s someone here to see you!” she shouts as he makes his way inside.

His mom is standing at the front door, and on the other side of it is Jonathan, looking a little nervous, and Nancy with stern determination on her face.

“Were you outside?” His mom asks.

“It’s okay don’t worry about it.” He brushes her off, feeling half bad about it.

She gives him a once over, her face expressing something that he can’t understand. She had been happy enough when Nancy and him were dating, but mostly because she was a _nice (rich) girl_. He’s sure she doesn’t like the look of Jonathan.

“I’m going to finish up breakfast.” And she promptly leaves the room.

Steve is stunned. He’s standing at the door staring at the two of them -both of them have changed since this morning- and unable to come up with anything to say. Nancy is the one who eventually breaks the silence.

“Can we come in?” A small, polite smile on her face. Steve thinks she looks like she’s trying to lure a nervous cat towards her.

“Yeah, yeah.” He can hear the disbelief in his voice. “Come upstairs.”

He does not want his mom to hear _anything _any of them have to say to each other.

They sit on his bed, all three of them. Steve by his headboard and Nancy on Jonathan beside each other at the foot of the bed, much too close to be comfortable. He’s sure they notice the pictures above his bed. None of them say anything for too long. Jonathan coughs in what’s probably an attempt to alleviate tension.

“I’m sorry.” Is all Steve can come up with. It’s met with Nancy’s wide eyes.

“Sorry?” She asks.

“Steve, _I_ was the one who kissed _you_.” Jonathan says in a quiet voice. He’s hunched into himself, definitely uncomfortable.

Steve’s not sure how to respond to that, he goes for trying to brush it off.

“You were drunk.”

“We all were.” Nancy says, matter-of-factly like she always does.

“I shouldn’t have let you. Either of you. I know it’s not what you want.”

“_Steve_.” Jonathan looks him in the eyes like he’s going to say something, but there’s no follow up.

“We were _all _drunk. It’s not your fault.” Nancy again. Her composure is incredible because Steve knows they _all _feel like they want to die right now.

“Shit Nance it is my fault though!” He gets off the bed so quickly that he stumbles to the ground and Nancy flinches. “It is my fault because I’m so fucking in love with you.” And he guesses he’s going with love declarations now because once he starts he can’t stop himself.

“I love you so much and I have since fucking eleventh grade and it’s never stopped even when I thought it did. I love how you’re so much smarter than me and how funny you are and how you can kill a fucking inter-dementional monster and barely flinch.”

“_Steve._” Jonathan says again.

“Not just her Byers,” Steve reaches under his bed and pulls out the box with all of Jonathan’s letters. “I kept every letter you sent me. Every single one and all of the photos you sent with them. I read them when I get sad or lonely or just have a shit day and think about how much I miss you and wish you never moved out of this godawful town. I love you both so much and it’s been eating me alive since the fucking summer!”

They’re staring at him again. Jonathan’s eyes are wide in shock and Nancy looks much more put together. She puts her hand out and Steve, terrified, takes it.

“Jonathan and I have been talking. For a long time, not just since last night.” There’s a pause between each sentence like she’s giving Steve time to process them and he’s so thankful for it. “We want to try.”

In her other hand she takes Jonathan’s. “We both love you too.”

Steve is floored, completely stunned. And then in a reversal of last night, Nancy is kissing him, and then Jonathan is kissing him, and he thinks maybe things aren’t going to be as bad as he thought.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> So this chapter is out way later than I wanted it to be but, LAST CHAPTER! Please leave a comment I want to know what everyone thought!! You can also reach me at @nancywheelerlesbian on Tumblr! A huge thanks to @agentorgana for writing the head canons that inspired this all!


End file.
